96 SHORT COMMUNICATIONS
Newson, M. D. (1975). FLOODING AND FLOOD HAZARD
IN THE UNITED KINGDOM, 59 pages, 90p, ISBN
CL-19-874035-2. Weyman, D. R. (1975). RUN OFF PRO-
CESSES AND STREAMFLOW MODELLING, 52 pages, 90p ISBN
C19-874038-7 Oxford University Press Series. Theory
and practice in Geography.
The style of this new Oxford series on Theory and
Practice in Geography is so unusual that it seems appro-
priate to divide this review into two sections, the first
giving an appraisal of the two texts themselves and the
second section commenting briefly on the value of this
rather novel style of publication.
Both of these books have the air of carefully prepared
handouts intended as a discerning guide to the relevant
literature and as the skeleton of a lecture course during
which ‘flesh’ would be added to the outline in the form
of detail, explanation and example. In order to compress
even a n overview of the subject into this 15 to 20,000
word book, Weyman in ‘Runoff Processes and Stream-
flow Modelling’ has been forced into a fairly blunt style;
at times insufficiently explained and at others rather too
simple and uncritical which suggests that the author
experienced some difficulty in a book of this length in
finding a ‘level’ at which to write. Newson, on the other
hand, in ‘Flooding and Flood Hazard in the United
Kingdom’, solves the compression problem by a bias
towards the physical aspects of flooding and hazard to
the detriment of economic aspects. The economic mater-
ial that is included tends to deal mainly with urban and
urban fringe situations and not with the extensive rural
flood hazard assessed in the 30’s and later by Gilbert
White as being economically as important as urban
flooding.
Who will buy these books and are they ‘value for
money’? Most university courses will only allow three
or four lectures to cover flood hazard. Will students pay
9% for reading material for this number of lectures? I
think not, especially as the going rate for paperback
seems to be a penny a page in the larger books. More
important, will be the remainder of such a course cover-
ing other aspects of hydrology and hazard be supported
by similar texts? Where I see the major role and market
for these books is in the increasingly popular modular
courses where eight or ten lectures will expand upon
one topic. Here these books could be used to their great-
est advantage as a means of presenting the crucial points
and significant papers relevant to a specific field of
interest.
ADRIANMCDONALD